<description>
                    &lt;p dir="ltr"&gt;Mariah Carey has more No. 1 hits than any other American artist to date.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p dir="ltr"&gt;&amp;ldquo;Fantasy,&amp;rdquo; &amp;ldquo;Vision of Love,&amp;rdquo; and &amp;ldquo;We Belong Together&amp;rdquo; have all landed at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100. Part of the magic is in her voice, but it&amp;rsquo;s also in her songwriting &amp;mdash; a skill that has too often been overlooked.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p dir="ltr"&gt;Music journalist&amp;nbsp;&lt;a href="https://www.instagram.com/danamo/"&gt;Danyel Smith&lt;/a&gt; interviewed the artist for The New York Times&amp;rsquo; list of &amp;ldquo;&lt;a href="https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2026/magazine/greatest-american-songwriters-alive.html"&gt;The 30 Greatest Living American Songwriters&lt;/a&gt;.&amp;rdquo; Sam caught up with Danyel to talk about Mariah Carey&amp;rsquo;s songwriting and sampling prowess, the systemic disrespect for Black women in music, and how Mariah cemented her place in music history.&amp;nbsp;&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p dir="ltr"&gt;Sign up for &lt;a href="https://www.kcrw.com/culture/shows/the-sam-sanders-show"&gt;Sam&amp;rsquo;s Newsletter&lt;/a&gt; to get behind the scenes stuff from every interview each week.&lt;/p&gt;
&lt;p&gt;&lt;em&gt;The Sam Sanders Show&lt;/em&gt; is a production of KCRW and Sam Sanders Productions.&lt;/p&gt;
                </description>

The Sam Sanders Show

Is Mariah Carey the Greatest American Songwriter?

Is Mariah Carey the Greatest American Songwriter?

Description